Shearer – who is now a Washington-based adviser on Asia-Pacific security for the US Centre for Strategic and International Studies - said the government needs to begin planning for continental missile defence.

A former defence strategist for George W. Bush’s administration and now chief executive of the US Centre for Strategic and Budgetary ­Assessments joined Shearer’s call that Australia should be planning for a longer-term continental missile shield for Australia.

“Highly accurate cruise missiles and hypersonic anti-ship ­missiles are proliferating in the ­region and pose an increasing menace to deployed forces, such as Australia’s large amphibious ships.

“Australian military planners (also) need to grapple with the ­incipient threat posed to the mainland — particularly to defence ­facilities in northern Australia used by the ADF and rotating US forces — by China’s increasingly large and sophisticated long-range nuclear and conventional missile force.”